Nicholas Parsons

Presenter0:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in two thousand seven.

Presenter0:28

My castaway this week is Nicholas Parsons, actor, quiz master, cabaret performer, straight man, panel show host, and fully qualified marine mechanical engineer to boot. Spanning more than sixty years, his professional credits defy classification and flout convention. Yet it's not just the duration of his Shobiz career that's exceptional, but the fact that he made it on stage at all. From well-to-do parents, his family had a neurotic dread of the dissolute thespian life, and did their utmost to thwart his budding ambition. Sickly, dyslexic, and with an intermittent stutter, he wasn't an obvious star in the making, but, as he himself puts it, the joy of performing is that you overcome the insecurity of your nature and are reassured by the reaction of the audience. Sir Nicholas Parsons, you still need reassurance then, after all these years. You're still out there performing.

Nicholas Parsons1:19

People get great joy in performing. I think any actor and certainly in any comedian would say that the pleasure of getting an audience, reaction, and that uplift, especially when they laugh,

Nicholas Parsons1:32

Nothing replaces it, and if you

Nicholas Parsons1:35

Really love that.

Nicholas Parsons1:37

It inspires you to keep going, and that's probably why I'm still working at my advanced age.

Presenter1:41

I mentioned all the different roles that you've played over these many decades. We're going to talk about them in detail, but of course just a minute, the great radio show that's been going for forty years now has been the backbone, in a sense, of your career. And in that role, you're corralling these people, quite often big egos, quite often people who like to go off tangentially to get a laugh. You're having to corral them into a space to make sense of the game. Do do you find the role of straight man satisfying enough?

Nicholas Parsons2:09

I obviously do.

Nicholas Parsons2:11

You can find that role in life. Quite young I did, because my brother was very charismatic and dominant, and uh I had this insecurity from my stutter and dyslexia, which I didn't know what it was. But I got my laughs by allowing myself to be put upon. And of course it came in very handy when I worked with Arthur Haynes, because you can play for the comedy, play for the laughs, help the comic get his laugh, and at the same time be a wonderful foil. My good friend Paul Merton said to me once, because I often throw lines out to him on just a minute, because I know the way his comic mind works, and he'll come back with the most amazing put dance. And he said to me he said, You you really are a very good straight man, Nicholas.

Presenter2:51

Tell me about your first piece of music.

Nicholas Parsons2:53

Well, it's a great piece of music, beautifully sung by a great interpreter singer, Satchmo, Louis Armstrong. It's a wonderful world, and when you get to my age you realize what a wonderful world it is.

Speaker 23:07

I see trees of green.

Speaker 23:11

Red Road is Jew.

Speaker 23:15

I see them blue.

Speaker 23:18

Five minutes.

Speaker 23:20

And I think to myself.

Speaker 23:26

What a wonderful room

Speaker 23:33

I see skies of blue.

Presenter3:36

Louis Armstrong and Wonderful World. So, Nicholas, you grew up in Grentham, in Lincolnshire. Your father was the local GP. What sort of an upbringing was it?

Nicholas Parsons3:44

Uh

Nicholas Parsons3:45

Well, it was a

Nicholas Parsons3:46

what they called upper middle class. And my father was a successful doctor. He's he's a lovely fellow, and I know his patients loved him very much.

Nicholas Parsons3:55

One of the things, of course, coming from Grantham, everybody, when you mention it, when I do it at my comedy show, people react because they know that Margaret Thatcher was also born in Grantham. She was then Margaret Roberts. And my father did have among his patients the Roberts family.

Presenter4:09

Oh yes he did.

Nicholas Parsons4:09

And he may have

Nicholas Parsons4:11

Oh yes, he d oh certainly. He ministered to all the Roberts family. In fact, I I believe he actually brought young Margaret Roberts into this world. Which not everybody's going to approve of that particular action.

Presenter4:22

Uh

Nicholas Parsons4:22

Yeah.

Presenter4:22

And and was it quite privileged? I mean, did you have nannies and maize and high school?

Nicholas Parsons4:25

Yeah, yeah.

Presenter4:26

We had but you

Nicholas Parsons4:27

See, in those days there was what was called a servant class. We had a nanny, yes, we had a housemaid and a cook, and it it wasn't sort of that you were particularly privileged, that you could just afford it. And I had a lovely nanny whom I absolutely adored. I kept in touch with her, and also I still keep in touch with her children. And she meant a great deal in my life.

Presenter4:47

You say that you felt yourself to be the least favoured of the three children. I mean, what what was the communication by your parents? How did you know that? That's that can be quite a subtle thing for a moment.

Nicholas Parsons4:57

I think I've only said that in retrospect and if I don't know I've actually said those words because it wouldn't be fair to my parents. But I think it's true that my mother was somewhat irritated. I think I reminded her of her brother whom she didn't get on with. And when I showed these signs of wanting to be a performer, she freaked out because she thought everybody in the show business must be debased and depraved and I was so weak and ineffectual. And the fact that I was dyslexic...

Nicholas Parsons5:24

Which they didn't understand.

Nicholas Parsons5:26

It meant that I was very slow at writing, and also having a very strong and dominant older brother whom I looked up to and admired tremendously, maybe that inhibited me, and the stutter maybe the stutter arose because of that.

Presenter5:37

Some of the things that I I've read about your childhood, there there seem to be contradictions, because you're saying that you were this uh stuttering, dyslexic, ineffectual child, and yet at the same time you were winning when you were at school, you were winning cups in boxing, you were a a keen cricketer, a good sportsman. Those things don't quite tie up. Did they not convince your parents that you actually were more capable and robust than they might initially have thought?

Nicholas Parsons5:59

Yes, it again

Presenter6:00

Her parents never came.

Nicholas Parsons6:00

To school.

Nicholas Parsons6:02

I don't know what it was. They I don't know whether they realized that I came actually my last year at the school, just before when the war started, I was top of the class, and there were some pretty bright people there.

Presenter6:11

Did you feel emotional or upset by the fact your parents weren't connecting with you? Or is that a terribly modern idea of parenting?

Nicholas Parsons6:18

I think you're being a very clever psychiatrist at the moment. No, not at all. And I don't remember it. I think.

Presenter6:22

Yeah.

Nicholas Parsons6:25

People didn't have the same understanding.

Nicholas Parsons6:28

of children and child psychology when I was young, and

Nicholas Parsons6:32

I think that my personality didn't gell very easily with my mother's.

Nicholas Parsons6:37

And while she obviously loved me and I I think I irritated her. And I was always fooling around and I was being told off for fooling around. And when you're often told you're a bit foolish, your defence is to act foolish. And if it gets a laugh as well, you go on doing it. So I think I gave the image of not being as bright as I perhaps was.

Presenter6:56

As you were saying, you did well though in school. You came top of the class and you could have stayed on at 16, but you didn't stay on. What happened? What happened?

Nicholas Parsons6:59

Yeah.

Nicholas Parsons7:02

What happened?

Nicholas Parsons7:04

Th that is a very sad thing which I don't understand, because the war came.

Nicholas Parsons7:09

And I could have continued with the school being evacuated.

Nicholas Parsons7:13

But my parents took me away from the school, and then they suddenly said to me

Nicholas Parsons7:17

So what are you going to do?

Nicholas Parsons7:20

And that's when I brought it up again. I said, Well, you know, I want to be an actor.

Nicholas Parsons7:23

And my father was very succinct and said, Well, we know all about that, but let's be serious.

Nicholas Parsons7:28

I think I was a bit shocked and shell-shocked in a way. And my uncle took a hand and he pointed out that I was always very clever at making things and repairing things. I had a lot of clocks I'd repaired and still have them. And he said, why don't you become an engineer? So he got in touch with relations in Scotland and they got in touch with friends and they arranged for me to start an engineering apprenticeship on Clydebank with a firm called Drysdales that made pumps and turbines.

Presenter7:51

And you would have been hollow?

Nicholas Parsons7:53

I was just over sixteen years of age.

Presenter7:55

But I'd like very much to talk about that in a moment, but for now let's hear your second piece of music.

Nicholas Parsons7:59

My next piece of music is the kind of music that I love to relax to.

Nicholas Parsons8:05

Tortez.

Nicholas Parsons8:06

And what I'm fascinated by musicians is the way they improvise on a musical instrument.

Nicholas Parsons8:12

and create the most wonderful sound from it.

Nicholas Parsons8:15

And I'm carried away. And Oscar Peterson is a fine example of that night train.

Presenter9:43

OSCAR PETERSON AND NIGHT TRAIN. So the English public schoolboy from St. Paul's, with the terribly nice accent, and I imagine the terribly smart clothes, finds himself in Clyde Bank.

Presenter9:54

I can't imagine a more extraordinary set of circumstances.

Nicholas Parsons9:56

A more extraordinary

Nicholas Parsons9:58

I know. I I can't believe how I survived actually. When I arrived the first day,

Nicholas Parsons10:03

I thought they were talking a different language. You see, I understood all.

Presenter10:10

And see, I understood all of that.

Nicholas Parsons10:11

Yeah.

Presenter10:11

You you

Nicholas Parsons10:13

And actually I discovered I actually got closer to one of them to listen that they were using words as adjectives that up to then I'd only seen written on lavatory walls. And it was a sort of new living, breathing experience. And somehow I did survive because maybe it's the one instinctive lesson of life that I've always known is that if you are yourself with people, you can make a relationship. And the fact that, again, humour was a great help. I was able to make them smile, to take off the different formal gaffers, as we call them.

Nicholas Parsons10:45

And now you have to remember, if they were straying to me, I was an absolute oddball to them.

Nicholas Parsons10:50

Because in those days, coming from English public school, we did speak very much more like that than I speak today. In fact, if you'll see me in some of the earlier films that I did and other things, not him I, but everybody else is talking very, very much like that. That was the way we talked, you know, the early 40s. I remember one of the young princess mates would come up to one day and say, here, Nick, we've got to ask you a question. You come here with your wah-wha action like that. I mean, I don't know how you expect to get along, because if you sit around here, if you play your cards right, we'll teach you how to get your effing horns dirty. We'll teach you about life. We'll teach you what it's all about. By the time you leave here, you'll be a man, I'm telling you. And was he right?

Presenter11:01

Hey, man, I'm not sure.

Nicholas Parsons11:28

He was, he was. I mean, they were great fellows. And I think it was, in retrospect, I realized, the greatest learning for life one could possibly have.

Presenter11:36

Now, as I mentioned, your family had this a wonderful phrase that you've used, this neurotic dread of dissolute thespian life, and it coloured all of the discussions that you had with them. But but you were sneaking in a little bit of that thespian life while you were training to be this marine mechanical engineer. What what did you do?

Speaker 211:43

Uh

Nicholas Parsons11:43

Uh

Speaker 211:43

It colour Uh

Nicholas Parsons11:48

A little

Nicholas Parsons11:52

Well, absolutely, because I think there was that iron determination in me somewhere to eventually get into the entertainment business and do something. And of course.

Nicholas Parsons12:02

The blessing of Glasgow to me was there's there's a great feeling for the theatre and the arts up there. And there was an amateur dramatic society I formed, amateur concert parties. And I went and joined one. It was called Scottish Command Troop Entertainments. They sent little groups of us round to entertain the troops on the ACAC sites, the anti-aircraft guns and the Baroom barrages. And I was doing my impersonations, personating all the film stars and the radio stars. And I was doing a bit of stand-up comedy, pinching jokes from the radio. And I was getting some valuable early experience. Tell me about your next piece of music. Next piece of music.

Nicholas Parsons12:42

Ah, neck and coal.

Nicholas Parsons12:44

I love

Nicholas Parsons12:45

Language.

Nicholas Parsons12:47

And I love the way people use language.

Nicholas Parsons12:50

I'm not a singer myself, though I work with music, but I'm always deeply impressed with how a singer can take the words of a good lyric.

Nicholas Parsons12:59

and interpret them, and bring them alive, and when he blends out with the tune.

Nicholas Parsons13:04

It's to me quite magical.

Nicholas Parsons13:07

In fact, to make a pun, it's unforgettable.

Presenter13:10

Yeah.

Speaker 313:10

But

Presenter13:10

Have a

Speaker 313:10

Allow you that.

Speaker 313:13

Unforgettable

Speaker 313:17

That's what you are.

Speaker 313:24

Unforgettable

Speaker 313:28

Oh, near our far

Speaker 313:35

Like a song of love that clings to me.

Speaker 313:41

How would fall?

Presenter13:42

That was Nat King Cole and unforgettable. So, Nicholas Parsons, after the war ended, what was your next move? My parents still didn't want me to.

Nicholas Parsons13:49

to become an actor, mother particularly.

Nicholas Parsons13:52

And asked me what I was going to do with my engineering. And I said, well, I've become an engineer, I'm qualified now, but I am definitely going to be an actor. And without any connections, I mean, what I did was I used to read The Stage, and Stage is a wonderful magazine if you find out what's going on. So I discovered the names of theatre producers, and I wrote and knocked on doors of all kinds of theatre management, saying, Please, can I do an audition? And if you push hard enough and persistent enough, eventually something gives way, and one little door gives way, and then another one does, and you move on from that.

Presenter14:26

How much were you earning then? I I mean, was the money good or were you essentially just surviving?

Nicholas Parsons14:32

Uh well, Benchman's just surviving, but you see, I was working.

Nicholas Parsons14:36

I was expressing myself.

Nicholas Parsons14:38

I was doing what I had dreamed of doing as a youngster.

Nicholas Parsons14:41

And as long as I was busy, I was

Presenter14:43

Yeah.

Nicholas Parsons14:43

had a job I was so happy.

Presenter14:45

Uh you were very busy at times. I mean you you were you were on the stage at the windmill between the were you between acts of the lovely ladies? I mean what what was your job?

Nicholas Parsons14:53

That was later. It was I was doing the cabaret. I got twenty pounds a week for cabaret, which was better than twelve pounds a week in rep.

Nicholas Parsons15:00

And then I did do an audition for the Wynneville Theatre.

Nicholas Parsons15:03

Which was the only

Nicholas Parsons15:04

a sort of musical variety theatre in existence then, because the Lord Chamberlain's office existed then, and they couldn't put anything on the stage which was too daring.

Nicholas Parsons15:14

I mean, Windmill Scott is a sort of theatrical mythology really, something which was very sexy and erotic and exciting. There's certainly a certain amount of eroticism there, but it was very bland, really, which built up wonderfully on all these pretty girls. And the comic always followed what was called the fan dance, where there was a girl with no clothes on between two huge fans. So we actually saw far more than the chaps in the front.

Nicholas Parsons15:38

But always it meant that as it was run like a cinema, six shows a day, as you walked on, people who were sitting in the front, and maybe seen it once or twice, they would leave, and people from the back would rush down and get those seats. And it's quite a challenge when you're doing the same material, you've seen that same audience, and you're coming on for the third or fourth time, and a lot of the same faces are still there. Some of them just pick up their newspapers and start to read.

Nicholas Parsons16:01

What I learnt there was how to make that difficult, strange, all male audience laugh. It was only after I had left the windmill that I learnt how to make any audience laugh.

Presenter16:10

Now, as you were saying, you were happy not because you were making your fortune at this time, but you were happy because you were working, you were expressing yourself on stage, and you were making some sort of a l living out of it. How did your parents then respond to this, having for years said you mustn't do this, don't touch it with a barge pole?

Nicholas Parsons16:15

I'm working.

Nicholas Parsons16:17

Delphon

Speaker 216:17

Yeah.

Nicholas Parsons16:17

To you.

Nicholas Parsons16:20

As a

Nicholas Parsons16:25

Obviously

Presenter16:25

Obviously one

Nicholas Parsons16:25

Once I proved it

Presenter16:26

Uh

Nicholas Parsons16:26

to them I could do it. They came round and they were very supportive. I mean I I hadn't degenerated to becoming an alcoholic or finishing up in the gutter somewhere, so obviously I was okay.

Presenter16:37

Tell me about your next piece of music.

Nicholas Parsons16:39

Well, when I was doing Cabaret, one of the songs I used to come on to was a version of Coal Porter's Just One of Those Things.

Nicholas Parsons16:46

And Ella Fitzgerald, who is probably my favorite singer, has recorded this and I think on that island, listening to Ella.

Nicholas Parsons16:55

in that wonderful escapist number singing It's just one of those things

Speaker 317:01

It was just.

Nicholas Parsons17:02

Yeah.

Speaker 317:04

One of those things.

Speaker 317:09

Just one of those crazy flames One of those bells that now and then ring Just one of those things It was just one of those nights

Presenter17:31

Ella Fitzgerald saying Cole Porter's just one of those things. We've talked about your role in just a minute as The Straight Man, if we can call it that, in a quiz set up. But your your proper role as The Straight Man was in uh comedy with Arthur Haynes. How did that come about? And and indeed it made you a household name, really.

Speaker 217:37

Yeah.

Speaker 317:37

Uh

Speaker 217:37

No. Excellent.

Nicholas Parsons17:44

Yeah.

Nicholas Parsons17:49

Yes, I think everything I've done ever since has stemmed from the success of that period in the sixties when our show became a top comedy show on independent television. But like so many things in our profession,

Nicholas Parsons18:00

The things you hope and expect will take off don't.

Nicholas Parsons18:03

And things which start in the most unfortunate way and suddenly do I mean, in nineteen fifty five independent television began, and George Black was going to make a programme for one of the new companies, A T V.

Nicholas Parsons18:15

And he called it Strike a New Note, the title of his father's famous wartime show with Sid Field, and I happened to see it, and it was pretty dire. But there was one chap in it who I thought was very talented, called Arthur Haynes. And the very next morning, I remember it vividly, my agent phoned and said, Nicholas, have you seen a programme called Strike a New Note? and I said yes, isn't it absolutely diabolical? He said they want you to join it.

Nicholas Parsons18:39

And I said, Oh, when do I begin?

Nicholas Parsons18:41

You know, we don't question and I joined it and at the end of six shows he got rid of everybody and kept Arthur and me and said, I think you two should do sketches together. And the rest is history. We just took off. We went to America, Ed Sullivan shows. It was it was great. And I evolved from being a sort of actor, comedy performer, into being a straight man. But that's where you use your experience in comedy to play comedy, but not always to get the laughs.

Presenter19:09

You say that you went on to the Ed Sullivan show a few times. Were you given the opportunity to expand your career in America?

Nicholas Parsons19:12

Yeah.

Presenter19:15

Yeah.

Nicholas Parsons19:15

I did get an opportunity. It was a play called Say Who You Are, which was after I'd broken up with Arthur Haynes actually, and had been in the West End, and I was asked to go and star one of the leads in Broadway in the play. I turned it down. I actually saw then that if I did it, it would be like taking a new way of life. And did I want to take my family to New York? This is showbiz. I turned down the opportunity of starring on Broadway. Where would that have taken me?

Presenter19:43

I wonder about that. I mean, your connection to your young family must have been incredibly powerful to have turned that down, given that your whole life, up until your family life, had been dedicated to pursuing your career.

Nicholas Parsons19:48

Yeah.

Nicholas Parsons19:53

Mm.

Nicholas Parsons19:54

Yeah, but but it was a magic to me. My two young children bless their hearts and they're still around, and I've got lovely grandchildren as well now they were such fun. I did so many lovely, exciting things with them.

Presenter20:06

1967, you won Radio Personality of the Year. Um briefly, how did that come about?

Nicholas Parsons20:08

Till the

Nicholas Parsons20:10

People, young and middle-aged like me, were breaking down all kinds of traditional archaic attitudes and so forth. And the big breakthrough on television came with that was the week that was. And I went to the head of light entertainment and radio and I said, You haven't got anything similar on radio. He said, No, we haven't. And I said, Well, I've got this idea. And we called the programme Listen to This Space. And it took off. And I was lucky to get the award, Writer Club Award of Radio Personality of the Year. Tell me about your next piece of music then. Well, it's all part of the 60s, my next piece of music.

Nicholas Parsons20:44

New things were happening in the theatre, and there was a musical came over from America called Hare, and I went to see it, and it was memorable for one scene I remember, because at the end of the first half

Nicholas Parsons20:55

They all seemed to be under a huge blanket, and they struggled to get their kit off, and then the blanket was whipped away, and they all stood up absolutely stark naked, and they went into another number.

Nicholas Parsons21:04

And, you know, it it wasn't done to be provocative it was actually rather innocent. And that was the joy of this period. There was a innocence, there was a great love going on everywhere.

Presenter21:08

Yeah.

Nicholas Parsons21:16

And one of the songs from that musical, which has always been with me ever since, is The Age of Aquarius.

Speaker 321:38

And love goes through the sky. This is the dawning of the age of Aquarius.

Presenter21:50

Fifth Dimension, performing Age of Aquarius from the musical Hair. Your most enduring role, then, must surely be Chairman of Just a Minute, as I said earlier, going for forty years. Can it be true you didn't want the job?

Nicholas Parsons22:03

Oh yes.

Nicholas Parsons22:05

Yes. I mean, sometimes you don't want a job because you don't think you're right for it.

Nicholas Parsons22:10

But when you get the job, you use all the experience you've got in your profession to try and make it work for you. Why didn't you want it?

Nicholas Parsons22:17

Well, uh first of all, it may interest you to know that the original choice for the chairman was going to be Jimmy Edwards, and I was going to be one of the panelists.

Nicholas Parsons22:25

And a young David Hatch, who just joined the BBC as producer, said, Nicholas, we're never going to get Jimmy on a Sunday when we want to record the pilot. He will be playing polo. So I think what we'll do is, will you take the role of chairmanship? And Derek Nimmer's free will put him on the panel. I said, please no, David, I'm not right for it. Anyway, I want to be on the panel. He said, I'll do a deal with you. Do the chairmanship for the pilot. And if we get the series, if it's commissioned, you go on the panel. Super, okay. Right. Did it. Pilot wasn't very successful. And they didn't want it. And David fought for it because he saw the potential. And he came to me and said, I've had to fight for this almost lemo job on the line. So he said, but I'm afraid you're stuck with what you've got because he said one thing they liked was the way you did the chairmanship.

Presenter23:08

Like any wonderful programme, of course, it it is the format that is the thing. It is a wonderful, clever, tight format. But of course it m it must have evolved over the years. Has it changed when it was uh first launched?

Nicholas Parsons23:14

Man, but of course

Presenter23:19

Yeah.

Nicholas Parsons23:19

Tremendously. I take some credit for that because I have evolved the rules. I got taken to task once on points of view when somebody wrote in and said Nicholas Parsons has changed the rule from hesitation, repetition, and deviation from the subject to hesitation, repetition, and deviation. Well, I had, because I really realized.

Nicholas Parsons23:36

If they did that, it gave scope for these bright comic minds to buzz in.

Nicholas Parsons23:41

and think something quite extraneous which was devious. If anything is going to achieve longevity, you have to instinctively adjust like that.

Presenter23:48

You really have to be on your metal for that programme when you're sitting there. I mean, you have to be. Do you have somebody talking your ear? God, no.

Nicholas Parsons23:55

It's the biggest effort of concentration of any job I do.

Nicholas Parsons23:59

And though I thoroughly enjoy it now, because it gives you a sort of faissant as you set off, but you're never confident in your profession if it's going to work.

Nicholas Parsons24:08

And

Nicholas Parsons24:09

I go out every time we do a new recording thinking it has worked before.

Nicholas Parsons24:15

But will it work again? And that sets the adrenaline going. And you go out there, you get fired up and you do it, and something happens. And it is the spontaneity of the whole thing which is conveyed to the audience, because they recognize that, which is also then conveyed to the listener.

Presenter24:31

Tell me about your next record.

Nicholas Parsons24:33

Ah, well.

Nicholas Parsons24:34

I think this is an indulgence.

Presenter24:36

You allowed that on your desert island, right?

Nicholas Parsons24:38

Am I right? It's a piece of music which isn't my favourite piece of music. It's not something that I would choose just to sit down and listen to necessarily. But it is a piece of music with which I've been associated now for 40 years. It is the signature tune for just a minute, Chopin's Minute Waltz. And if I was to listen to this,

Nicholas Parsons24:58

I would have so many wonderful memories coming flooding back.

Nicholas Parsons25:02

Of the great times in that show.

Nicholas Parsons25:04

and the wonderful people I've worked with, and the fun we've had. It would be self-indulgent, but lovely.

Nicholas Parsons26:00

And as the minute waltzes fades away, Kirstie, I have to What is your next question?

Presenter26:06

Well, I I have to tell people who was playing there, and then I'll come to the next question. I couldn't, I mean, that was just perfectly done, and as you've been doing it for 40 years, that was Arthur Rubinstein playing Chopin's waltz in D-flat, otherwise known, of course, as The Minute Waltz. As much as just a minute, the other programme that people automatically think of is that was it live from Norwich or just from Norwich? My memory isn't serving me well on this. It was Sale of the Century. On a Sunday night, I used to sit there in my pajamas watching you looking very sort of smooth and slick, and it had huge audiences-twenty odd million at one point, Sale of the Century was getting, and yet.

Nicholas Parsons26:10

I couldn't

Presenter26:41

I've read you've described it as a professional albatross around your neck. Why is that?

Nicholas Parsons26:47

Well, a number of reasons.

Nicholas Parsons26:49

And at that time

Nicholas Parsons26:51

People looked upon quizzes as sort of down market entertainment, and the press were very condescending and dismissive about it. And so, if you presented a quiz show, you were an object for ridicule and take up. I mean, the goodies used to use me as a regular ridicule character. And so.

Nicholas Parsons27:09

You didn't get any prestige from having a successful show, or doing it successfully. And it went on so long, it took me a long time after the show finished to re establish myself as an actor-performer in my own right. So do you think it was a mistake to do it? Well, what can you say it was a mistake? I mean, it was a success, and I'm proud of the success it achieved. But I never realised how commercially successful the show had become. In fact, the way I put it is that people, when they see someone in such a successful show, they think, that is you. Well, I used to say, no, it's a lovely job I had, but it was never a way of life.

Presenter27:47

And what about your personal life? Towards the end of the seventies then, your children were growing up and you both of your parents became ill towards the end of the seventies. They they died at the beginning of the eighties. And your marriage w was coming to an end. It did work, in a sense, keep you going?

Nicholas Parsons27:51

Hmm.

Nicholas Parsons27:54

Yeah.

Nicholas Parsons27:59

Yeah.

Nicholas Parsons28:02

Well, I did yes, I did have the security of of the Sale of the Century, which was great. And yes, my marriage to Denise did uh just drifted apart. We're still perfectly good friends, and we speak, and I have a lovely lady now called Anne, who's been with me now for almost the same number of years that Denise was. And um yes, but I was losing my parents then that they both uh disappeared.

Presenter28:21

Where are your parents proud of you?

Nicholas Parsons28:23

Oh, yes yes, I'm I'm sure they were. I'm sure they were. I think they had difficulty expressing it, but they were brought up in that generation. My dear father, whom I loved very much, it was a very

Nicholas Parsons28:34

austere man, and uh he was very weak and almost dying, and he paid me the most beautiful compliment, which almost brought the tears to my eyes. Well, he did, actually, but What did he actually say to you? He was in the hospital and very weak.

Nicholas Parsons28:49

And I even wonder whether he was going to last the night when I was sitting with him. He seemed to be dozing off.

Nicholas Parsons28:53

So I thought, Dad, do you mind if I put the television on? And I put it on. I didn't even know, because this is how little the show meant to me professionally. Sale of the Century was on.

Nicholas Parsons29:02

So I thought I'd watch it and see how it's it's going, and at the end I switched it off.

Nicholas Parsons29:06

and he had absorbed it all in his drowsy, sleepy state.

Nicholas Parsons29:11

And he said, I've always thought

Nicholas Parsons29:14

It was particularly clever.

Nicholas Parsons29:16

The way you did that very fast wind up at the end.

Nicholas Parsons29:21

and created that sense of drama which made the show so successful.

Nicholas Parsons29:27

Thank you, Dad. I I did that deliberately. I worked on it for years, and now you tell me, thank you. So I kissed him and I thought, well

Nicholas Parsons29:33

I don't know whether I should stay now all night or not. I went off, and an hour later he was dead.

Presenter29:39

Tell me about your next piece of music then.

Nicholas Parsons29:40

Next piece of music

Nicholas Parsons29:42

is emotional and nostalgic.

Nicholas Parsons29:45

Nostalgic because it comes from a Stephen Sontime musical, Into the Woods, which I had the pleasure of working in in in the nineties. And in that musical there's a wonderful song called Children Will Listen a most emotive song. And when it's sung by Barbara Streisand in a special recording she made,

Nicholas Parsons30:05

it becomes even more emotive.

Speaker 330:08

For the things you say

Speaker 330:12

Children will listen.

Speaker 330:15

Careful the things you do, children will see.

Speaker 330:22

Handle?

Speaker 330:27

Children may not obey.

Speaker 330:31

Our children will listen.

Presenter30:34

Barbara Streisand singing Children Will Listen from Stephen Sondheim's musical Into the Woods.

Presenter30:40

Your career has flourished intriguingly in a sort of postmodern kind of a way. I mean, for the last eight years you've been doing the Edinburgh fringe, you have this wonderful rapport on Just a Minute with Paul Merton, you've been elected rector of St Andrew's University a few years back. Why do you think you have this appeal to a new generation?

Speaker 230:52

Uh

Nicholas Parsons30:52

Mm-hmm.

Nicholas Parsons30:55

Yeah, that's

Nicholas Parsons31:00

If if I knew the answer. Perhaps it would unsettle the success, I don't know.

Nicholas Parsons31:05

I just I've always been aware of what's going on. I've always kept myself aware. And you absorb new thoughts, new ideas, new moods, and

Nicholas Parsons31:15

You don't

Presenter31:16

Stay in your own time, Wal. I'm wondering about this extraordinary not just the longevity of your career, but the journey into it, the plugging away, the knocking on the doors, all of those things that you did and now, as you say, you know, you keep the balls in the air, you do your one man show, you do just a minute.

Speaker 331:31

Yeah.

Speaker 231:31

Yeah.

Presenter31:32

The survival instinct is still very present. You still see yourself as somebody who has to turn a buck and you're only as good as your last show.

Nicholas Parsons31:41

I think so, but I think a lot of actors, if they were honest, would admit to that as well.

Nicholas Parsons31:46

And if they don't feel like that, then they could become complacent and find that they're not working. I mean, when people say to me, um, have you ever thought of retiring?

Nicholas Parsons31:55

And I said, Well, no, I am in a profession that retires you.

Nicholas Parsons31:58

They let you know when they don't want you to work any more.

Nicholas Parsons32:01

or the public don't appreciate you anymore.

Nicholas Parsons32:04

And I think that I'm privileged in the sense that I can still can work and and the fact that it still goes well.

Nicholas Parsons32:10

Um, I'll go on doing it.

Presenter32:12

Ideally in uh ten, twenty, thirty years' time, would you like to do a Tommy Cooper and turn up your toes on stage?

Nicholas Parsons32:20

I don't think I'll be here in 10 to 20 years' time either. You're looking pretty good, Nick. I mean, put it this way: if it happened.

Presenter32:22

Time.

Nicholas Parsons32:27

I wouldn't be embarrassed. I think actually it is a rather fabulous way to go, because people who love it, who love doing it, who are part of that

Nicholas Parsons32:38

Know that to die in harness.

Nicholas Parsons32:41

is probably

Nicholas Parsons32:43

The wave.

Presenter32:45

Tell me about your final piece of music, then.

Nicholas Parsons32:47

Well, I'd be on this desert island, and I thought, well, I've got all these lovely records with lovely associations, but I need also, I think, a piece of music.

Nicholas Parsons32:58

which would be exciting and rousing. Shostakovich is a a great composer, and when you get a piece of his music which is

Nicholas Parsons33:05

Full orchestra It's so rousing that you you get carried away and it stimulates you to carry on and go out and achieve something. Probably helped to keep me going and think, Right, I've got to get back to civilization. I've got to get up to morrow and find a way to get off this island.

Presenter34:20

Part of Shostakevich's Piano Concerto No. One, performed by Jeffin Bronfman, with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, conducted by Asa Pecke Salomon. So of course we come to the point now where I'm going to force you to uh to choose. You have, of course, the complete works of Shakespeare and you have the Bible, but you have to take another book. What would that book be, Nicholas?

Nicholas Parsons34:34

Yeah

Nicholas Parsons34:37

The Oxford Anthology of English Poetry. I love language, I love words, I love poetry.

Nicholas Parsons34:45

And it would be lovely just reminded all those great poets that I've read, you know. Blake was my favourite.

Nicholas Parsons34:51

and Browning and

Nicholas Parsons34:53

There's so many of them. They're they're all in it.

Presenter34:55

And of course you're allowed something on the island to make life a little more bearable, some sort of luxury. What would your luxury be?

Nicholas Parsons35:01

Well, I have listened to this programme for years, and I've suddenly realized that none of your people that you have condemned to this desert island will survive. They've all gone, for the simple reason

Nicholas Parsons35:12

It's salt water.

Nicholas Parsons35:13

So one thought maybe one should have a desalination plant so I could get some fresh water and hopefully survive.

Presenter35:20

It is a very good idea, but you know what I'm going to say. It's far too practical.

Nicholas Parsons35:23

Far

Nicholas Parsons35:24

You have to

Presenter35:24

You have to seek something much more useless than that.

Nicholas Parsons35:27

Well the other alternative is not useless, but it's more in the luxury field. And that is a little portable radio with an endless supply of batteries. You can say permanently tuned in to Radio Four.

Presenter35:38

Begrudgingly I will give it to you. I didn't didn't dare to turn you down twice. And um the one record that uh you would save.

Nicholas Parsons35:45

Oh, it would have to be children will listen.

Presenter35:47

Nicholas Parsons, thank you very much for letting us hear your desert ion and discs.

Nicholas Parsons35:50

Thank you for asking me. It's been a joy, a privilege, and a pleasure.

Presenter36:01

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Islandists archive.

Presenter36:05

For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.